NPG Condemns New ICE Deportation Guidelines

Claims Americans Must Reject Amnesty by Executive Fiat

ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 11, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Negative Population Growth (NPG) President Don Mann has strongly denounced a new policy being adopted by the Office of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) which seriously dilutes our nation's immigration laws and dictates a "hands off" policy for potentially millions of illegal aliens who face deportation.

Mann condemned a recent memo by ICE Director, John Morton, which mandates liberal use of the "prosecutorial discretion" of immigration enforcers to deter or cancel individual deportations. Using the justification that scarce fiscal resources require setting deportation "priorities," Morton's memo has raised the ire of Americans opposed to selective enforcement.

Mann decried the new policy by stating: "Those hoping to slow and eventually halt U.S. population growth expect that this extensive smorgasbord of ameliorating circumstances will give hard-pressed immigration agents ready justification for shelving an almost unlimited number of deportation cases – thus leaving these illegal aliens free to bask in all of the benefits afforded hard-working U.S. citizens and taxpayers."

He added: "The Obama Administration has displayed a total indifference to the immigration crisis. As it now backs off from seriously enforcing the laws against illegal immigrants it is single-handedly transforming our nation's immigration policy – all in the name of politics." Mann continued: "Americans favoring population sanity are concerned that this new directive gives a green light to millions of prospective illegal entrants who can't wait to sneak into our country and to millions now here illegally who might otherwise be induced by enforcement risks to go home."

Mann concluded: "It has been very frustrating that our nation's leaders have failed to move forward and enact responsible immigration reform. However, that stalemate should not permit the President to do an end-run around Congress and issue a politically-driven directive that sets a policy whereby ICE agents are told to grant 'de facto amnesty' to those illegals they opt not to pursue for deportation."

Mann hailed the news that Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) will soon introduce new legislation in Congress that would temporarily freeze the Obama Administration's power to grant amnesty to illegal immigrants. He pledged that NPG will put the full weight of its membership behind helping this bill become law.